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<title>the boy who refused love by champagnemoonlight (frozenlychee)</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668748">the boy who refused love</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozenlychee/pseuds/champagnemoonlight'>champagnemoonlight (frozenlychee)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, F/M, Graphic Description of Corpses, Guilt, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mental Health Issues, Other Additional Tags to Be Added</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 04:13:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,790</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25668748</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozenlychee/pseuds/champagnemoonlight</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He was seven when his brother 'became' a runaway terrorist.<br/>The victims? <i>His entire family.</i><br/>But Uchiha Sasuke didn’t allow himself to be some sob story. He never did.</p><p>(naruto modern au where sasuke was the sole survivor of a mass murderer where his missing brother is the main suspect.)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Haruno Sakura/Uchiha Sasuke</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>the boy who refused love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>tags will be updated accordingly to the on-going progress &amp; i will leave tws for each chapter as a reminder!!!<br/>stay safe everyone :]</p>
    </blockquote><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p><i>She deserved better.</i><br/>Sasuke reminded himself.<br/><i>He couldn't give her better</i></p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>this chapter mentions assault, ptsd, panic attack, gore, death, corpse, and implied self-harm, suicidal thought.</p><p>oh yeah and a whole lot of Guilt.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>      “Stay,” she hiccuped. Her voice trailed off into the awaited abyss, soft breath dissolving into the night air. “Please, stay.”</p><p>      “You’re annoying,” he replied, the cold hand still in her grasp. His rough tone softened with the glassy of her gaze. “<em>You’re so annoying.</em>”</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>      And then he left.</p><p> </p><p>—&amp;—</p><p> </p><p>      He didn’t leave immediately. Not at first, no.</p><p>      Not as quickly as he should have been, no.</p><p>      The young boy paced around in slow circles until he came to a halt, and then he would look at her again, another<em> ‘one last time’ </em> as he whispered discreetly to himself the consequences of being caught.</p><p>      The moonlight shined innocent and wide on her skin. Everything slightly golden with its touch as the night clouds ripped themselves from the light, its hue reflecting through the thin window glasses. Disregarding the streaks of twinkling constellations they once were infatuated with, he looked down. Dark eyes were only seeing her.</p><p>      She had been crying, her eyelids tainted with red and purple veins. The once luminescent green eyes were paled and watery by his touch, and even though Sakura had told him that love hurt sometimes, it shouldn’t have pained her this much over his own burden.</p><p>      She was the fragile petal of a flower yet to blossom, and beyond all belief to crush everything clean on his path for salvation, he just couldn’t bruise it. </p><p>      He could never bruise <em>her</em>.</p><p>      The boy gazed down at the way his shadow dragged, startlingly dark and hollow from the bed where she rested, and he started walking away.</p><p>      One day, she would wake up and be relieved. She would be someone else’s lover, someone’s mom and she would look back at all of this as some cautionary tales, because that was all he was, really.</p><p>      He was doing her a favour, Sasuke reminded himself, white knuckles slowly flushed back with colours when he placed the blanket over her body. She didn’t stir, too tired out from blobs of tears and hoarse voice that asked him to stay.</p><p>      He brushed back her pink bangs, using his thumb to wipe the nonstop streaks that wouldn’t even spare her in her sleep.</p><p>      Her hair used to be longer.</p><p>      Cherry blossom locks that would drape down her back elegantly, silky and free in the seasons’ breeze. Occasionally, she would doll up and pin back the dawn-tinted strands with her red headband. It’d be tied in a bow from Monday to Wednesday, plain crimson red from Thursday to Saturday, and maybe, just maybe, she would switch up to a blue headband on Sundays.</p><p>      Then he and Naruto got her a brooch for her thirteenth birthday—a string of sparkly daffodils, and it was inseparable from her hair for two weeks straight.</p><p>      She loved it. She loved them. Sakura cherished her childhood friends more than anything, and he knew that.</p><p>     But <em>he </em>was the problem. Sasuke sighed. He was the problem because less than a month later, a group of people purposely grabbed her by the long hair, leaving cuts and bruises all over delicate skin for associating with him.</p><p>
  <em>     And she deserved better, she did.</em>
</p><p>      It took place at a bus stop. The sun stretched itself over the horizon, and they had finished a movie that ended rather confusing. Still, it was just another day travelling the neighbour town. He had told her to stay put when they lost sight of Naruto, rushing back inside to find the blond guy who had carelessly wandered off to the bathroom with all of their bus cards. He told her to stay put at the station, and like good listener, she did.  </p><p>      Mere minutes later, the attack happened.</p><p>      Everything tumbled down like a house of cards. She had been shaking, pretty knuckles now busted and bleeding from defending herself after the first two minutes. Her signature red dress rugged and scratched, the garment was torn viciously up her thighs, and blood boiled hot in his veins when she burst into tears at the mention of it.</p><p>      The hair clasp broke. Shattered and stepped on. And while she tried to pierce it together, her forehead bloomed a yellowish bruise from being dropped against the concrete road; its noise punched through the quiet town but not fast enough to alert him, only reverbing in the thickness of the atmosphere.</p><p>     There were three assaulters; two lean guys who mockingly abused her while a young woman clutched her hair and shoved her down repeatedly for entertainment. They hadn’t been older than her if not for a few years, but they were unmistakably stronger, far more resilient and Sakura was frail.</p><p>     She was thirteen. Alone. And it was getting more dangerous by the second. </p><p>     In a desperate act of self-preservation, she crawled out just enough to grab her scissor in the mixed of items sprawled out from her bag, not being able to see well from the bloodshot eye—and went straight for the first thing she could think of at that moment:</p><p>     Her hair.</p><p>     Sakura bid farewell to a part of her identity that day, something so dear to her heart as she cut herself free from their grip. She painstakingly shredded the strands apart, swallowing back the tears because she couldn't let herself burst. Not now. Not when she was so close to freedom. Not when she could fight back.</p><p>     The pink locks quickly dropped in ugly chunks, mixed in with dirt and crimson streaks that spurred out when she stabbed the person behind her in a deep cut, making a run for it.</p><p>     Adrenaline beat loudly in her ears as she limped across the empty parking lot back inside the mall. She smashed her bruised body over the clear glass, and the crowds inside stared at her with wide eyes of concerned. She didn't care how their gazes were piercing harsh into her skin, opening up every cut with scrutiny and shocked because she got back in now.</p><p>     She was safe, now.</p><p>     Sakura stumbled back to the place when less than an hour ago, she had been a different person, and her friends pushed through the crowds to reach her touch. She looked like she'd been through hell, and yet, when Sasuke rushed to her side soon after the chaos, she only smiled, soft lips painfully cracked.</p><p>     "Hey stranger," she murmured, lean figure soon collapsed into his arms when Naruto dialled for help.</p><p>     They got help to carry her back to the bus station because despite it all, Sakura said she was okay.</p><p>     Naruto explained what he knew to the police while Sasuke continually glanced over his shoulders impatiently, thinking of what he would do the thugs who wronged her like this. When the officer asked her if she knew why they attacked her, she didn’t speak. And when Naruto waved at her, the light didn't reach her emerald eyes as it should have.</p><p>     The question came to an abrupt end when they couldn't get anything else out from her.</p><p>     It wasn't a robbery, not a sexual assault and according to the few words she had exchanged, Sakura stated they didn't know each other.</p><p>     She flopped down over the pool of her old hair like an efflorescent lotus, her breath hitched inside the ribcage too tight for her lungs, but she grinned at them again, through swollen eyes that she was alright.</p><p>     Except she wasn’t.</p><p>     She flinched when the emergency crew eventually came to pick her up.</p><p>     It was the first of many times where he would catch that painful expression on her face, pure fear blending in with unadulterated rage like a smeared clot of dried blood, and she would then gag on her tears, once more.</p><p>     The wound inside her gaped at him, and for the second-longest second of his life, Sasuke peered back and wished it had been him instead.</p><p>     It would have been easier, he thought, if the one hurting had been him, instead.</p><p>     The thought lingered on their way home from the hospital, even with Naruto's sleepy weight on one side of his shoulder and his overexaggerated snores to drown out the silence, Sasuke couldn't help but feel responsible no matter what.</p><p>     Then there was a small yawn.</p><p>     Sakura told him she was feeling tired, and he smoothed the back of her shirt in soothing stroke—something his mom used to do when he was stressed. The dawn-tinted hair girl almost flinched away at his touch, but she stopped herself and began to snuggle her face against his other shoulder, quickly falling asleep in the back seat of her parents' car.</p><p>     He didn't look at the Haruno's eyes for the rest of the ride, and even if they hadn't blame him for letting this happened to her, the voice inside him told Sasuke: <em>he deserved it</em>.</p><p> </p><p>     It didn't help when he knew the reason behind the attack, trembling knuckles whitened on the report paper.</p><p>     Maybe everything he touched, burned.</p><p>     “<em>What we did was righteous justice on the terrorist”</em>, the offenders claimed.</p><p>      They mentioned the Uchiha mass murder being their main motive, having bonded over their mutual interest in becoming outlaw vigilantes to the point of obsession, believing almost if not all conspiracy theories there were on the Internet. They decided to clean the streets by themselves. To clean the last of the Uchiha, by themselves. So to seize an opportunity to get rid him outside of the small town was beyond ecstasy.</p><p>      And apparently, that sickeningly meant everyone else around him, too.</p><p>      Sasuke opened his mouth to speak, but Sakura tugged at his sleeve with her bandaged hand, and he let the anger simmered in his chest. He was supposed to be her support, her parents had entrusted him to look out for her, and there it was, the real reason why their daughter got fucked up had been <em>him </em>all along.</p><p>      The teen bit his lower lip, wondering if he bit hard enough, would it have eased the hurt inside his friend. The words all buzzed and distorted outside deafened ears.</p><p>      He blinked. His legs jittered anxiously underneath the table, and when Sakura reached her fingers to intertwine with his, Sasuke didn’t return the gesture.</p><p>      <em> He didn’t deserve the gesture. </em></p><p>      They went home afterwards, and despite how much her parents stated it wasn’t his fault, Sasuke took the blame anyway. He looked at the social service workers he had come to respect, then at the wreckage he caused their daughter to go through, and it hurt.</p><p>      The rest of the car ride resided in silence, accompanied by the occasion noise of Sakura’s finger tapping against the window in rhythmic to something he couldn’t quite tell. Nevertheless, the voice in his mind was loud, and it wondered how much more distraught could he possibly cause her, believing this to only be the tip of the iceberg.</p><p>      Naruto called later that night through the landline, but none of them picked up.</p><p>      Sasuke walked up to the guest room he’d been too familiar to, falling back into the cold mattress and shut his eyes from everything else, ignoring the way he could hear Sakura sobbed in anguish behind her locked door. </p><p>      Ignoring the way guilt <em>hurt</em>.</p><p>      They were alerted later on that the thugs got some hours of community work and a few months in juvenile jail, but the damage was done regardless. </p><p>      It left Sakura flinching when they walked past certain areas, flipping a hoodie over the back of her head as if she would be snatched up otherwise by invisible hands nobody else could see. She squirmed at the sight of branches, of people closely resembled the criminals who tortured her for their own repulsive joys. And then she would rush inside a bathroom, a hallway, any place where she could hide as the panic kicked in, its ugly form melting everything around her until she could see nothing beyond endless darkness anymore. Only to come back pretending she was okay, hoping that if everyone else didn't see her crack, she would eventually be okay.</p><p>      It left her in long hours of therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, hours where she could no longer spend with her two closest friends because they were considered ‘active triggers’ according to her counsellor. And Sasuke didn't know much about psychology, but he knew enough to respect her healing space, so he and Naruto would hang around less often. He would even crash at the latter's place to avoid burdening her parents because being a teen meant his window of being adopted was closing in by the minute, and it wouldn't help--he shook his head, almost manic at the idea--that he unintentionally caused harm to his social worker's daughter just by living.</p><p>      But sometimes he would come back inside the house, mostly to give her school notes of classes she missed, and he wouldn't be able to leave.</p><p>      The attack left her whimpering in her sleep every three nights with the night terrors that wouldn’t leave, leaving scratch marks on pale arms out of unconscious thoughts. He could hear it but every time he woke her up, Sakura would only sleep worse afterwards. She would start wearing long sleeves, embarrassed and flustered by the awkward attention drawn at her scars; and he could hear Mrs Haruno asked in a soft voice if Sakura had been self-harm out of frustration, only to shook her head in dismissive at the awful idea.</p><p>      And Sasuke was the reason for all of that.</p><p>      He <em>caused </em>all of that.</p><p>      He pondered, sometimes, how he could live with that.</p><p> </p><p>—&amp;—</p><p> </p><p>      Sasuke lost his family at the age of seven.</p><p>      He remembered coming home to a ghostly silence. The light switches were non-working, but it was fine because he was a big boy now, and grownup wasn't scared of the dark. He sniffled, the stuffed nose still unable to scent anything through his cold, so he tried something else; using his ears this time. Tiptoeing into the abyss and began his well-worn path to the kitchen, Sasuke felt almost giddy at the thought of surprising everyone else with his movements.</p><p>      The ticking sound of the grandfather clock guided him closer and closer to a silhouette a few steps away. The boy blinked, his eyes promptly adjusted to the dark with a few rubbed and he jumped forward to wrap the back of his mom, who was rocking back and forth on her wooden chair—into a hug.</p><p>      He didn't have time to render the cold skin, the uneasiness in his guts or the lack of <em>her</em> in the room when her body suddenly spilled into a mush of flesh and bones beneath his embrace. Her head crooked backward, the neck hanging by mere cords before collapsing onto the floor as he stumbled back in horror. What once was his mom, now just a head. And he screamed, feets stumbling out of the kitchen straight to the backyard where his dad would sit, screaming for him and his brother. Screaming for anyone at all.</p><p>      But there was no reply.</p><p>      The silence continued to be eerie.</p><p>      With his heartbeat sped up achingly behind the small chest, he climbed up on his treehouse, pulling his legs close to his chest as he locked the hatch door tight. It was <em>their</em> safe haven, the space Itachi had built from scratch for the siblings to have a secret base when he calmed down an eager-to-grow-up Sasuke. If his brother was still here, this was the only place he would look for Sasuke right now, and if that meant staying still until the sunrise, he would.</p><p>      And so he waited. He waited patiently for the nightmare to be over, and he would wake up in his bed, his mother's dainty fingers brushing back the black bangs as she told him to get ready for school. Her voice sweet when she reminded him not to have too much sugar again to avoid wild dreams, and he would press his face against her warmth, nose scrunching in her faint floral scent of chamomile until it filled his lungs close to bursting.</p><p>      It didn't happen.</p><p>      Sasuke woke up to loud sirens and strange faces, soon learning that he was the sole survivor of mass murder.</p><p>      He learned a lot on that morning. That the killer only targeted the Uchiha bloodlines who were in the police force. That his father had already been killed long before his mom was, his body shoved inside a safe with all limps broken off their joints. That his mom was killed while being conscious of her death. That the killer came back, wet soil sticking to the floor as the person seemed to be checking thoroughly for every name on their list, expecting to clear them all.</p><p>      The unnerving pause filled in the blank faster than his brain could process. He blinked slowly.</p><p>      <em>The killer came back for him.</em></p><p>      Sasuke swallowed down the things he'd just overhear, clutching on the yellow blanket the emergency workers had draped over his shoulders and played ignorance to them for now.</p><p>      He simply had one last question on his mind.</p><p>      "I couldn't be the only survivor", he asked, "my brother must have lived". Except, he soon found out from another officer on the crime scene that the fate of his brother became undecided. That there wasn't any trace nor motive for anyone to commit such heinous crime, and somewhere along those lines, the media pinned it on Uchiha Itachi to be the cold-blooded terrorist who planned <em>this</em> massacre.</p><p>      Sasuke didn't reply. He watched the body bags of what used to be his parents being wheeled out onto the back of a brightly lit ambulance and by that point, the memory rippled in his mind at the slightest shake. Everyone he had ever loved was abruptly gone after one night, disappeared, soon to be buried deep under dirt and concrete and the thought made him want to rip the warm yellow cloth into pieces.</p><p>     For the first longest second in his life, Sasuke wished he had been dead with them instead.</p><p>     He bit down on his lower lip until the taste of iron leaked into his mouth, it was metallic and weird and overwhelming and he spat it out, blobs of hot tears leaking out from shut eyes down to his palms and he hated it. He wanted to wail for his mom, for his brother, for his father; but he shouldn't because he was a big boy now and he should be stronger than this. He should be equipped to know how to deal with this because death was a natural concur no matter the situation and he should have and there was so much--</p><p>     Someone rushed towards him, shielding Sasuke from the world collapsing down his shoulders and he eased himself into their touch.</p><p>     "Oh sweetheart," said the voice he couldn't recognise through the loud sirens and his own sobbing. The hiccups hurt. He couldn't breathe through the clotted noses so his breath hitched harshly with each sob, and it hurt. His head soon rested against warm chest that he should have felt safe in, but he didn't because it didn't feel like mom and it would never feel like her again and he didn't know what to do and he was so scared and he--</p><p>     And somewhere in the deepest corner of his mind, a voice planted a seed of hurt.</p><p>     <em>He didn't deserve love.</em></p><p> </p><p>—&amp;—</p><p> </p><p>      He was fourteen when Sakura curled up on her bed, sobbing to fatigue at his goodbye to her. She begged him to stay, to not leave her alone, <em> please</em>, and he did. The dark hair teen sat next to her mattress, his fingers caught stiff in hers as she drifted to the long-awaited sleep.</p><p>      It just wasn’t the forever pause she had hoped.</p><p>      On his fingertips, her warmth lingered longer than it should, and Sasuke tightened his grip as he climbed down from her window. He said goodbye to the house that had been his ever so often. Dark eyes glinting back one last time, sending a silent farewell to the second parents who had been there for him since the day he lost everything, and maybe if he had been braver, he would have told them how much they mattered in his heart.</p><p>      But he didn't think he could ever leave if he had said a proper goodbye.</p><p>     <em>They deserved better.</em> He mumbled to himself, tired legs moving swiftly to catch the late-night ride out of town. His legs picked up speed when he walked past the places they once were, hoping they would hate him for what he'd done to their family—knowing full well they never would.</p><p>      He dashed, straying away from the road where Naruto's house was, not wanting to bet his chances on fate letting the latter stopped him. It wouldn't be a surprise, Naruto had always had a thing for catching him at his most vulnerable, and Sasuke was growing fondly sick of it. Sooner or later Sakura would cave in and talk about their last conversation, about him leaving, and maybe—Sasuke thought, reflecting through all those innocuous glances his blond friend shot at their friend—it would be better without his interruption. The stars were so much brighter tonight, and maybe, without his touch, their relationships would be as well.</p><p>      The thought vanished when he walked on the streets of pink petals.</p><p>      The cold wind bit more than usual through ruffling trees, and he shoved his hands in his pockets, suddenly scared of losing the touch he held dear so fast. He thought about Sakura. Thought about the way her lips whimpered and the bag in the corner of her room.</p><p>
  <em>      "If you cannot stay, may I go with you then?"</em>
</p><p>      The girl foolishly asked and though he snickered a reply, his heart ached at the sight. </p><p><em>      She deserved better</em>. He twisted the inside of his cargo pants when the air from his lungs came out in a thick fog. He knew she did. It was only a matter of time until she'd know that, too. And once the world showed her what it could offer, she would be glad he left, Sasuke thought cynically.</p><p>      The teen shuffled his way to the last carriage with only one backpack, touching his card against the electronic scan before slouching down his seat. Letting the smell of late-night ride washed over him when the surrounding started blurring past his eyes.</p><p>      Sasuke rested his head against the train window, watching thoughtfully as he left the small world he had grown up in—behind. He blinked, a flush of pink cherry blossom petals fluttered past his gaze into the oblivion, and Sasuke let go of the haunting thought. </p><p>      <em> He couldn’t give her better. </em></p><p>—&amp;—</p><p>      </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>hello this chapter is my gift for <a href="https://twitter.com/NocturnalWalkr/status/1287098977532485632">#narutaugust</a> day two: 'sakura deserved better'</p><p>i feel like the theme a lot of people went for was sakura being happier with someone else, but i took one look at it and went <i>'ah, the classic case of sasuke feeling guilt over not believing he deserved love because the uchiha loved so hard they only had sharingans from heartbreaks'</i> like the masochist i am.</p><p>of course given the au, i might not incorporate the aspect of red eyes into the story, but ah let's see how it goes :].</p><p>thank you for reading, stay safe!<br/>—<a href="https://twitter.com/frozenlychee/">frozenlychee</a></p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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